Atonement
by I Dare You 413
Summary: On a snowy winter night, Barbara Gordon answered the door expecting a friend. She instead opened the door to a crazed madman pointing a gun at her; eying her like a starved dog eyes a pile of meat. His smile was the last thing she saw before that one bullet traveled through her abdomen into her spine as her sight faded to black.


Atonement

On a snowy winter night, Barbara Gordon answered the door expecting a friend. She instead opened the door to a crazed madman pointing a gun at her; eying her like a starved dog eyes a pile of meat. His smile was the last thing she saw before that one bullet traveled through her abdomen into her spine as her sight faded to black.

It took fifteen minutes for the police to arrive to find that man—that

(Clown)

thing walking down an alley a couple blocks away. He was apprehended by Batman and the police. Meanwhile, Barbara was taken to the hospital and her father notified.

At the police station, the man was holed up inside an interrogation room being monitored by police and Batman. They turned only once when the doors opened and Jim Gordon walked through and sat on a bench—dazed and flustered. Batman approached him but was stopped by an officer. He looked the young man in the face and he only shook his head. Batman stepped back and nodded towards the door to the interrogation room. The officer nodded in agreement and Batman stepped through and slammed the door behind him.

"Joker…" he growled.

The clown acted surprised, "No! You'll never take me alive, Bats!" He looked down at his cuffed wrists, "Oops. Maybe you did." He grinned. Batman moved closer, "And might I say, that was one heck of a right hook earlier, Batty-man. Almost chipped a tooth!"

Batman grabbed him by the collar and tossed him across the room. Joker splattered against the window with a thud and hacked up blood on the floor. He yanked him back up and snarled, "Why did you do it?"

Joker choked out a laugh, "_Do_ what_?_ I haven't _done_ anything." He looked Batman in the eye and saw something different. Somehow, in some way, something affected him.

"You were the closest one to Barbara's house—with a gun." He slammed Joker roughly against the window. "Explain yourself."

Joker pushed Batman back a little, "No need to be so rough, Bats." He gave Batman a sly look, "I was going for a nice walk with a gun full of blanks. Yes, Batsy, blanks. Check the bullets. Any who, as I was strolling I happened to feel the need to visit my old friend Barbara and shoot the breeze," he winked. "I waltzed into her room and saw her napping on the floor and left her peacefully." He straightened his collar.

"Very funny-," Batman started.

"Ah-ah-ah, I'm _not_ joking."

Batman paced the room for minutes trying to process the whole night. The young girl he trained, the young girl he swore to protect, was shot. Shot by his mortal enemy and all he could do was argue him in circles.

"This isn't helping…" he murmured.

Joker arched an eyebrow, "Hm?"

Batman walked to the door, "I gotta go help her," he spoke.

Right when he was about to walk out he heard, "Oh by the way, Bats, why is it that kids seem to die around you?" Batman stopped in his tracks. "It's just an observation. I mean, I practically swooped out that one kid from under your care. HA! Let's be honest here, he wasn't an A student on the Bat Training Course was he? He didn't last an hour with me!"

Batman turned around; slowly he said, "Don't talk about him. You have no right to talk about him like that."

Joker giggled hoarsely, "I suppose you do, right? Well now's your chance, Batty-man. Criticize your Boy Wonder on tape," he nodded to the camera on the ceiling, "and let it all out." He rested his chin on his two fists in a fascinated manner.

Batman darted to him, grabbed him by the collar and tossed him over the steel table. Joker smacked into his chair—knocking it over with a thud. He hopped over the table and picked up Joker, "Enough of this," he spat. "I will ask you one more time, why did you shoot Barbara?"

"If it's a confession you want," Joker replied, "you'll have to be a teensy-weensy bit more polite. How about a "please"?"

"You're lucky if you get a life sentence for this. You shot the Gordon's daughter; they won't take that too lightly." Batman threatened.

Joker flapped his cuffed hands, "Ah, you worry too much, Bats. I'll be fine but it's nice to know that you're worried about me." He grinned.

Batman ignored his comment and carried on, "When they brought you in they found you had a revolver. You claim there were only blanks in the gun but there was one shot fired. That bullet was the bullet that hit Barbara wasn't it?"

"Pfft, I _lost_ that bullet. I dropped it in the middle of my stroll through that alley you beat me up in." Joker said to Batman proudly.

"You lost that bullet in Barbara's _spine._ Don't play games with me, Joker." Batman curled his hand into a fist.

Joker looked at Batman inquisitively for a moment. He looked into his eyes and he looked right back. The two of them have had a bloody rivalry for years. Joker surfaced years prior during a confrontation between Batman and Black Mask. They were fighting in an incinerated apartment and Joker caused Black Mask's mask to be welded to his face.

Three years before shooting Barbara in the spine, Joker kidnapped, beat, and burned Jason Todd to death. He explicitly

(_happily)_

explained the horrific event in front of a jury. One of the jurors left for unknown reasons. It was most likely due to the disgusting story being told. Joker delightfully spoke of how he knocked the boy to the brink of insanity with a crowbar. He tied the boy to a chair and showed him various and gruesome pictures of Joker's victims being mutilated.

_And when he lost it—and I can tell you what that's like! I covered him in gasoline and burned him from the bottom up. He didn't even scream once. You wanna know the last thing he said to me before he died? As his little feet burned he just whispered, 'Daddy.' Think that's scary coming from me; you can't even imagine how that gave __**me**__ the willies! HAAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!_

How could Batman let him live for so long? He knew what was right and that was to pay him back every bit of pain and suffering he unleashed on families all over Gotham. He deserved to be killed.

Joker furrowed his brows and squinted, "You know who you remind of, Bats? A couple years ago, in court, after I killed your little buddy, there was this guy—crying the entire time. I couldn't tell who he was 'cause he had sunglasses on, you know. Anyway, after an hour or so into the hearing, he left. He just stood up from the back row and walked out." Joker laughed a little, "You're probably wondering what this has to do with you, right? He had that same expression you had on your face when you found out who was shot. Has the Batman been moved?"

"Me not being moved is the only thing that has kept you alive, Joker." Batman slipped. Batman noticed his mistake as Joker had uproariously began laughing.

Joker wiped a tear from his eye, "Ohhhhh, Batsy, I bet that's the first time you've told that one. Mr. Goody-Two-Shoes won't kill anyone, we all know that." Batman was going to say something but was interrupted, "Then again, _anyone_ can do my job. Look at Harvey-," Joker began.

"Harvey was dealing with psychological problems; Harley throwing acid in his face didn't help that."

Joker tilted his head side to side with an agreeing look on his face, "Okay maybe he wasn't the best example. Let's use the _old me _as an example."

"What?"

Joker motioned for Batman to come closer, he did so cautiously, "_If you take these cuffs off, I'll tell you everything_." He whispered.

Batman walked back to where he was previously standing in the small white room. "That will never happen in this lifetime."

Joker rolled his eyes, "Oh fine, I won't tell you the story."

"You'll be arrested for withholding information from the police. Either way at the end of this you'll be off to Arkham." Batman elaborated.

Joker shrugged, "Okay. Take me off then—let's go to prison, eh!" He stood up and walked past Batman to the door. He fumbled with the doorknob for a moment, "Um…a little help, please."

"Never mind…I'll take the cuffs off." He turned and unlocked them and hooked them onto his belt.

"Ah! Much better, Batty," Joker made an exaggerated stretch.

Within a second, Joker grabbed a batarang off of Batman's belt and flung it across the room. Batman tackled Joker over the table and heard a crack. He looked up and saw the batarang sticking out of the camera that was recording them.

"I hate eavesdroppers, don't you?" He questioned.

The two stood up and stared each other down. Batman didn't know what was going to happen next. It ranged from a clean confession that wouldn't even be recorded to the two of them battling each other to the death in the middle of the room to end it once and for all.

Batman got to his feet, "That isn't going to help your case at Arkham. I don't care about your past, vermin. It's a shame whatever hell-hole you crawled out of had to deal with you all by itself."

Joker giggled, "Yeah they didn't put up as good a fight as you, that's for sure." His giggle turned to a laugh and he rolled around on the floor. A bead of sweat dripped off of his forehead. "Oh but they tried—they tried to kill me! No one can! We all know you won't!" He gathered himself for a second, "I SHOT THE GIRL!" He screamed.

Batman snarled as he grabbed Joker by the collar and slammed him against the wall. He punched him in the face, causing blood to spill from his mouth. Joker began talking again, "And with no cameras, you have nothing on me! You can't kill me, you can't arrest me—nothing!"

Batman dropped him and started for the door but stopped in his tracks. He fixed his mask, "I don't have to kill you," He grabbed the door handle, "but I don't know about the next man."

He left and Joker's eyes widened as James Gordon entered the room.


End file.
